Help identify my upright (now with photos)

[momo]

So this old guy has been with me since about 92. It is the only DB I have ever owned, and it could well stay that way, save me getting a HUGE DB gig. Lately, I have been wanting to know more about its origins. It is kind of like an adopted child wanting to know its real parents. It never hurts to know your roots.

So here is what I DO know about it. It is a solid top, and I believe laminated flat back. The label inside reads Cremona anno domine (sp?) 19___. I have had it since the early 90s, which I believe pre-dates the current Cremonas from China. ALso, I have played those basses, and these are nothing alike. Some have guessed it is a Chezc or Romanian bass from the 60's, but no firm answers.

Any help is greatly appreciated. (pardon the dust, mess, and poor spelling. My house is being rennovated.)










I have tons more photos if any more will help.

THANK YOU SOOOOOOO MUCH!!!

[Steve Swan]

You do have one of the dreaded Cremona basses from Saga. The viking ship logo is common to all of their brand names.

[momo]

Dreaded??? Why dreaded? What should I know about it? Also, any ballpark figures on value?

[Ed Fuqua]

Originally Posted by momo

Dreaded??? Why dreaded? What should I know about it? Also, any ballpark figures on value?

Read the NEWBIE sticky in BASSES.
In order to give you a ballpark value, I'll need to know how much you paid for the strings you have on the bass....

[Jeff Guevin]

I daresay you could get at least $2000 from akaHank.

[momo]

Wow, I must say, I am a bit taken aback by how rude some of these responses can be. This bass has been with me for over 15 years, and does not play or sound anything like highschool basses. The fingerboard was replaced by John Peterson at World of Strings a few years ago, and it has had several good setups in the past few years. The tone any playability is comprable to several basses costing 4k and up in John's shop, but is understandably nowhere near the likes of 6-10k basses. Is it possible that it is a 16 year old China bass? Sure, but that would have required the previous owner putting on a LOT of wear during the year they owned it.

I came here looking for honest info about the bass, not snotty remarks from the last two posters about paying me for the strings and asking AKAhank to buy the bass. I had no intention of this turning into the Antigua thread, maybe that just got a few people wound up to feel like it was okay to put my bass down like this.

Sorry if I seem so thin skinned about this, but this bass has been my main bass for quite a long time. I am quite partial to it, despite realizing it is essentially a nice student bass. Now if anyone has anything CONSTRUCTIVE to say about its origins, I would appreciate it. Thank you.

[Greg Clinkingbeard]

The bass is wearing Obligato strings which partially explains your attachment to it. No, I'm not piling on with Fuqua.
Obligatos probably sound good on that bass.
Steve Swan knows what he's talking about and I would take whatever he says to the bank.
No doubt, the bass sounds good, but I have no idea about the value. If you like it and it has lasted at least 15 years, what difference does the opinion of others make?

If someone told you that it was a European bass from many decades ago, it wouldn't change a thing. It is what it is.

It has served you well, so just play it.

[momo]

Thank you clink. I could care less if this came from China or Italy. It is not as though eastern europe was well known for high quality goods in the 60 or 70s. I have never gotten a clear answer on where it was from, so I just went with what both John Peterson at WOS and the old Violin Outlet in Las Vegas (not the sellers) told me.

The question I guess I will ask next is that if this is related to the crappy Cremonas that everyone complains about, how long have these been as bad as they are now. Even if mine is only 15 to 20 years old, has the Saga company been putting these out for that long?

[Steve Swan]

I worked in the warehouse for a few months before doing telephone sales in the same building for Saga between January 1986 and July of 1988. During that time Saga was really ramping up their Chinese sources for the violin family because they rightly guessed that it would be the largest part of their buisiness starting in the 1990s.

The reason that I left the San Francisco area to live and work in Santa Cruz was because I couldn't live with the horrible attitude that Saga held against its own customers if they compained about the crappy quality of the cheap stuff that we sold. Returns were virtually impossible. Customers were always made to feel that it was their fault that some POS instrument had failing glue joints or cracks from green wood. The Initial stocking order was always the largest, with a huge turnover in customers and lots of very ill will created. From what I have seen and heard in the last 20 years, nothing has changed.

In 1982 I was managing the San Francisco acoustic shop that the owner of Saga had started. When the he and his partner had an acrimonious business divorce, my very first act was to peel off a sticker on the front of the cash register. There, right under the customer's nose, was the motto of the former owner "The customer be damned!"

Companies like this operate under a philosophy that there is a never-ending line of suckers (store owners) that will buy really cheap stuff. I have always felt that there is a quality level below which nothing is a "good deal".

Momo: Enjoy your bass. It may hold together for a long time. That has not been the experience of a great many people who learned the hard way. I feel pretty bad for all of the people who get turned off to playing bass by having terrible experiences with Saga's instruments.

[momo]

Thanks Steve. And now I know. I paid about $500 for this back in the day, and since have put about 1k-15 in work on it. That included a new fingerboard and a couple of seem repairs. The bass plays and sounds good, but was nothing more than a student bass when I got it. With the money that I put into it (little by little over the last 15 years) it is a great workhorse of a bass. Now I can feel better about knowing where it came from and what a great bass came out of some nightmares. Thanks.

[Basschair]

It gets like that here sometimes, and I have a feeling that some of the posters should have added a few " " to their smart-behind statements (IMO ).

As far as value goes...well, to be honest, it probably isn't worth much monetarily, but it seems like this is a case where it's worth quite a bit to you. Keep it, keep playing it, play it into the ground, love it to death!

Originally Posted by momo

Wow, I must say, I am a bit taken aback by how rude some of these responses can be. This bass has been with me for over 15 years, and does not play or sound anything like highschool basses. The fingerboard was replaced by John Peterson at World of Strings a few years ago, and it has had several good setups in the past few years. The tone any playability is comprable to several basses costing 4k and up in John's shop, but is understandably nowhere near the likes of 6-10k basses. Is it possible that it is a 16 year old China bass? Sure, but that would have required the previous owner putting on a LOT of wear during the year they owned it.

I came here looking for honest info about the bass, not snotty remarks from the last two posters about paying me for the strings and asking AKAhank to buy the bass. I had no intention of this turning into the Antigua thread, maybe that just got a few people wound up to feel like it was okay to put my bass down like this.

Sorry if I seem so thin skinned about this, but this bass has been my main bass for quite a long time. I am quite partial to it, despite realizing it is essentially a nice student bass. Now if anyone has anything CONSTRUCTIVE to say about its origins, I would appreciate it. Thank you.

[pdbass]

Originally Posted by Basschair

Keep it, keep playing it, play it into the ground, love it to death!

+1.

Don't take what anyone posts personally. I've read disparaging posts about Ron Carter's bass as well as being personally slammed because I disliked a certain Chinese bass that everyone seems to love. If it sounds good and feels good--keep on playing her. My own experience: reading 100 posts that a bass sounds really great will never make it sound great to you if it doesn't--and vice-versa.

1k over 15 years of steady gigging? And she can cook?

[Jeff Guevin]

Momo, yes, you're thin-skinned. Really. Sorry you didn't like my joke. Best of luck with your bass.